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ECO-FRIENDLY OFFICE

Office eco warriors

beyond reports on how Bracken Workplace Plus, one of Yorkshire’s most prestigious office-space providers, are making a big difference to the environment by introducing a number of eco-friendly measures.

T he Bracken team have always had an interest in the environment and as owners of two properties and lease holders of a third, they are lucky enough to be able to employ policies across all their workplaces to reduce the impact their offices have on the environment.

But with over 65 businesses working under their roofs, they are now looking to go even further with their energy-saving measures.

Talking about Bracken’s existing policies across their three Leeds office centres, chief operating officer Denise McGeachy said: “First and foremost, we operate in refurbished buildings.This is one of the most impactful means of recycling when compared to the environmental bearing and carbon footprint of a new build office building.

“Every office and kitchen have mixed recycling bins, which means we don’t just recycle paper, but cans, tins, cardboard and plastic bottles.We currently recycle 35% of the waste we produce with none of the waste from our buildings going to landfill and we aim to increase this figure to 50% by the end of the year.”

Bracken are also proud to buy their energy from renewable sources with electricity supplier, Scottish Hydro producing electricity from 100% sustainable and renewable sources.

Where possible they have upgraded lighting to LED which consumes far less energy and they have also introduced motion sensor lighting which ensures lighting switches off automatically when the room is empty.

The company, which runs The Tannery, Calls Wharf and Albion Court office centres is also planning on transferring their drinking water supplies from bottles to a mains-fed filtered water system and so reducing the plastic consumption.

Moving forward, Denise says they are now exploring more opportunities to cut their carbon footprint.

She added: “We are actively looking at the possibility of creating our own renewable energy through solar generated power. With both Calls Wharf and The Tannery having large roof spaces that could accommodate panels, we are in talks about making this happen.

“Additionally, we are looking to improve bike storage across all three sites to encourage more people to cycle to work and we are supporting the use of electric cars by installing car charging points. – the first of which have already arrived at The Tannery.”